Best Budgeting Software Wirecutter

You already know that budgeting is the way to go if you want to see improvements in your finances. But, there are so many budgeting software platforms out there. It can be difficult finding one. This guide shows you the best budgeting software for tracking and managing your money.

Wirecutter rated Simplifi by Quicken as the easiest, most comprehensive way to both see where your money is going and plan for future expenses. They advise You Need a Budget( YNAB) for people who are obligated by a budget that makes them account for each and every dollar in their bank account (YNAB).

Best Budgeting Software Wirecutter

Simplifi by Quicken

Most budgeting applications are either simple to set up but ultimately worthless, or they are so complicated and boring that they turn away anyone who doesn’t have a spare week to look into their accounts. Threading the needle is simple. It allows you to seamlessly link your bank accounts and combines practical tools with an approachable interface to motivate you to live within your means.

Our favorite feature is the personalized spending plan, which estimates how much money you have left over to spend for the remainder of the month after taking into account your expenditures and savings objectives. Although Simplifi is not free, it is less expensive than alternatives with similar functionality. A stake in the outcome may also motivate you to persevere.

You Need A Budget (YNAB)

A zero-based budgeting method, where you designate every dollar in your bank account to either a spending category or a savings target at the beginning of each month, may be for you if you want to manage your money more strictly. The greatest software we’ve discovered to assist this strategy or philosophy of budgeting is You Need a Budget (YNAB).

It can take some time to fully comprehend the complexities of making the appropriate allocations, but for those for whom this strategy works, the rewards can be enormous: Your brain is educated to spend less. Although YNAB had a high learning curve, it also had more synchronization problems with several banks during our tests. Additionally, it misses some Simplifi features like desktop notifications, financial flow predictions, and live customer assistance.

Who this is for

The most important rule of personal finance is to spend less than you make and save the difference if you want to live within your means and see your money grow. (Or, to put it another way, make more money than you spend and put the extra money away.) That’s more difficult than it seems, especially if you’re not keeping track of your earnings and outlays.

Anyone who wants to better manage their finances without having to manually add up figures in a spreadsheet each month should use a budgeting software. A budgeting software can automatically show all of your transactions in one location when it is linked to your bank and credit card accounts. It can also typically classify them for you and produce useful reports to give you an overview of your spending. More on that shortly. We are aware that many individuals are concerned about the security and privacy of these apps.

Budget apps can be divided into two categories: trackers (like Mint) and zero-balancers. Tracking apps are easy to set up, provide a bird’s eye view of your accounts, and show your transactions in real time. Zero-balance apps, on the other hand, encourage a more hands-on approach by making you account for every dollar you earn (X amount for savings, Y amount for rent, etc.), but they are typically specialized and expensive.

Because Simplifi strikes a balance between the two, we advise it for the majority of users. It keeps track of your spending, ongoing debt, savings objectives, and earnings history to calculate how much money you have available to spend in any area you choose in a given month. Spreadsheet-based budgets (as well as some other budgeting software) ask you to make a large number of categories and give each one a specific cash amount, which is not only overwhelming but also highly likely to fail. (Have you ever received a hefty bill for an unexpected expense, like an auto repair or an urgent dental visit? Such things have the potential to derail your financial plan.)

Best Budgeting Apps 2022

CountAbout

A personal financial and budgeting software program is called CountAbout. It is noteworthy since it is one of the few systems that can import data from Quicken or Mint. You are urged to do that as soon as you join up, and there are some helpful instructions that lead you through the process.

Additionally, it links to your other financial resources, which include banking, credit card, and retirement accounts at thousands of different financial institutions. Additional features include support for recurring and split transactions, categories that can be defined, running register balances, and multi-factor login protection. Additionally, it makes advanced budgeting possible by enabling tasks like account reconciliation and register balance monitoring.

The web-based interface of CountAbout allows it to be used on a complete PC in addition to the iOS and Android platforms. Starting with a Basic account, it is accessible through a subscription interface, but transactions must be input manually. A more useful Premium account, on the other hand, can automatically download transactions from your financial institution.

Mint

From the same people who brought us Quickbooks and TurboTax, comes Mint, another mobile-based solution (opens in new tab). It makes keeping track of expenditures and balances simple. By creating an account and linking all of your financial accounts, Mint can analyze your spending patterns and suggest offers for credit cards, retirement rollovers, and savings account deals that could save you money.

Through multi-factor authentication, VeriSign security screening, and the option to remotely delete your financial information in the event that your mobile device is lost, Mint offers protection.

You Need a Budget (YNAB)

A contemporary method of using a budgeting system for personal money is called YNAB (You Need A Budget). The millennial demographic will undoubtedly be particularly drawn to its stylish interface.

The purpose of YNAB is to give every dollar a job by connecting accounts to create a budgeted amount, and then assigning where the money goes by the category including immediate responsibilities like the rent and utility bill, actual expenses like medical and auto maintenance, and debt payments.

The right panel of the interface displays the general budget information, including the total spent last month, the monthly budget, and any underfunded areas, in plain sight. A weekly video, a podcast, and a newsletter are used to promote and teach better budgeting practices. Additionally, it promotes goal-oriented saving for retirement as well as seasonal gifts.

The user interface of You Need a Budget is surprisingly strong and can be customized to meet a person’s demands depending on their financial situation. You are able to immediately import transactions from a bank account after adding one. Naturally, as your updated financial information is entered into the various categories, the overall financial picture will change.

Quicken

Quicken is PC software that can be downloaded. It is unusual in that it supports both Windows and Macintosh platforms, in contrast to other of the more heavily mobile-focused solutions. It is a well-known financial and budgeting tool that has existed since the days of DOS and Apple II computers.

To make things simple and eliminate the need for tiresome manual entries, Quicken operates by downloading all of your transactions. It includes cutting-edge features like integrated Quicken Bill Pay, data export to Excel, the opportunity to create personalized invoices with your own logo, and safe online backup of Quicken files to Dropbox cloud storage.

Different pricing tiers are available depending on the features you need, such as free online bill payment, priority customer assistance, and personalized budgets. There is even a tier that can categorize home and business spending separately and send you customized bills.

A few useful new features were added to Quicken in the most recent update, and the Mac version saw some significant improvements. The Home tab, which provides a thorough summary of your financial situation, is where you’ll start your financial journey. There is also a cool Wizard-style system for beginners.

Moneydance

For quite some time, Moneydance has been a well-liked desktop money management option, and many Mac users are also admirers. Although using it on the Apple OS platform is undoubtedly a joy, this program is also available for Windows and Linux.

Regardless of the flavor you prefer, the software is unquestionably speedy and simple to use. Additionally, if you reside in the US, it has been regularly enhanced to integrate with all of your bank accounts, as well as credit cards and investments, which makes it really appealing.

Moneydance is available for the same price in all of its variants, including the Windows and Linux editions as well as the Mac OSX edition. For individuals who choose a mobile solution, there are other editions available with variations for iOS and Android.

The good news is that Moneydance does really come with a demo edition that you can use to familiarize yourself with its features and capabilities before making a purchase.

Pocketguard

Using Pocketguard is ideal. You frequently find yourself feeling little anxious about how much money you’re spending. There is a desktop version of this financial management tool in addition to versions for Mac OS and Android.

However, the mobile edition of this bundle is absolutely worth trying if you’re seeking for a convenient quick reference guide to your finances at any time of the day or night.

With its primary In My Pocket star feature, it’s accessible for both the US and Canadian markets and enables you to consolidate all of your incomings and outgoings into one practical location. As a result, budgeting becomes much more effective.

There is a free basic edition of Pocketguard available that is nevertheless quite feature-rich. If you’re sufficiently taken with what it does, you could want to upgrade to the Pocketguard Plus model, which has a monthly or yearly subscription, in order to increase the usability.

Simplifi

Quicken, a personal finance program, made its debut in the early 1990s and quickly became the industry leader. In fact, it is the sole desktop application that offers complete assistance for all facets of personal finance. The same business unveiled Simplifi, a brand-new web-based personal finance solution, a few years ago. A younger generation and others who wish to check their financial accounts, keep tabs on daily spending, and work toward savings objectives are the target market for Simplifi, which is created for a distinct market. It’s not Quicken light; it’s a totally different strategy. You can stay on top of your money with Simplifi thanks to its novel data views (watchlists, spending plans, and reports), new user interface, and clear and useful dashboard.

PROS

  • Exceptional user experience with great dashboard
  • Excellent transaction management
  • Helpful Spending Plan and Watchlists
  • Good reports
  • Top-notch mobile apps

CONS

  • Subscription fee
  • Lacks credit score
  • Lightweight bill tracking
  • Features not particularly good for the self-employed

Using Simplifi Is Not Like Doing Accounting

Anyone who uses Simplifi desires simplicity and a user-friendly, intuitive layout that isn’t cluttered. Nobody wants to spend hours hunched over their computer recording, planning, and reporting tasks that Quicken users frequently perform in order for the program to function properly. They want to sign in, check their account balances, see how much money they have available to spend this month, and determine whether their financial situation is in order.

Simplifi outperforms Mint, our Editors’ Choice winner for free personal finance applications, in this regard. Given that Mint has more functionality, there is more data to store. Simplifi, on the other hand, is made to cut down on the time needed to obtain financial information. Your account balances are displayed in a vertical pane on the left of a dashboard. The same page displays slices of the most often requested personal finance data, such as condensed versions of your spending plan, forthcoming transactions, the top spending categories, and spending watchlists (more about those various features later). Six-month graphs show your earnings and expenses.

The most significant screen that Simplifi has is perhaps its opening one. This homepage is better than Mint’s, where you have to scroll down a lot to see everything. More so than Mint and Quicken Deluxe (our Editors’ Choice winner for paid personal finance apps), Simplifi’s interfaces are all appealing, user-friendly, and dynamic. The design of Simplifi is more unified than that of our Editors’ Choice winners.

How Much Does Simplifi by Quicken Cost?

The annual cost of Simplifi is $47.88 or $5.99 per month. If you want to give it a shot before subscribing, a 30-day trial is offered.

It’s uncommon to pay for a personal finance app of Simplifi’s grade. The majority of other apps, such as WalletHub, Credit Karma, and Mint, are cost-free. The same firm that owns Simplifi also owns Quicken Deluxe, which has a list price of $59.99 annually and additional investment tracking features as well as tax-planning tools that Simplifi does not.

What’s New in Simplifi?

Since our last review, Simplifi has incorporated some helpful new features. Although it now has a custom income option that makes it slightly simpler for self-employed people to use the service, Quicken Deluxe still outperforms it in that regard. Additionally, Simplifi has enhanced its investment tracking and introduced a new tool that honors individual accomplishments (Achievements).

Additionally, Simplifi’s primary Spending Plan has been improved to support the business’s focus on budgeting. A performance-over-time tool and improved reporting were among the further updates the company had previously announced but have not yet been released.

How to Track Your Income in Simplifi

You track and categorize your revenue in the same way that you do your spending. Simplifi works well if you’re a W-2 employee and receive regular payments for the same amount. Finding one of those deposits, setting it to recurring, and then clicking “Is Recurring Income” will bring up a page where you may choose the frequency are all that is required. Your bank will deposit your paycheck anyhow, but if you set them up to be recurring and properly categorize them, they’ll become a part of your spending plan (more on that later).

Simplifi is less helpful if you work for yourself or have side jobs that cause your income to fluctuate from month to month. Not that you should stop using it, though. In fact, for those who work for themselves, the capacity to track and organize revenue and expenses is essential. When it’s time to complete your annual return and pay anticipated taxes, you’ll need that information. But unless you have consistent clients that pay you about the same amount each month, you won’t have an accurate picture of your predicted balances at the beginning of the month. You can set up particular projects as recurring income if such is the case. Setting up custom income that overrides your scheduled income total is an additional choice (if there is one). Making an informed guess may be necessary, which is generally the best that many independent contractors can manage.

Mint vs Ynab

YNAB

  • How It Works: YNAB helps you proactively manage your money by prompting you to allocate every dollar of your income to expected expenses or savings for that month
  • Reporting: Reports in three categories: spending, net worth, income vs. expense
  • Extra Features: Allows you to plan as far into future months as you’d like
  • Ease of Setup & Use: Adding your accounts is easy, but getting acclimated to the YNAB budgeting philosophy and process involves a learning curve
  • Device Compatibility: iOS, Android, web browser, Apple watches, Alexa
  • Cost: Free trial period, then $14.99/month or $98.99/year, with money-back guarantee
  • Best For: Those wanting to take a very hands-on approach to forward-thinking budgeting, including adopting a new way of thinking about “giving every dollar a job”

Pros

  • Teaches a new way to think in advance about how you’ll spend or save every dollar of your income
  • The very proactive, hands-on approach may help you save more money than other systems can
  • Well-designed web interface
  • Enables you to plan as many months in advance as you’d like
  • No ads or offers appearing in the interface

Cons

  • Involves a bit of a learning curve and can feel a bit overwhelming when first starting
  • Regular disciplined interaction is necessary to fully benefit from the YNAB budgeting philosophy
  • Can seem pricey (no free version after free trial)

MINT

  • How It Works: Mint enables you to regularly review all of your financial accounts, including enabling you to see exactly where you’re spending your money
  • Reporting: Reports in multiple categories, including spending, income, & net worth
  • Extra Features: Provides access to a free copy of your credit score
  • Ease of Setup & Use: With its more hands-off approach, Mint is very easy to set up by simply adding all of your financial accounts
  • Device Compatibility: iOS, Android, web browser, Alexa, Google Assistant (only for Android users)
  • Cost: Free, supported by ads and offers
  • Best For: Those who want to categorize their spending, create this month’s budget, and see an overview of all of their financial accounts in one place

Pros

  • Very easy to set up and use
  • Once your accounts are connected, the approach can be very hands-off, meaning you can come back anytime and catch up
  • Connects with an exceptionally large number of financial institutions, making almost all U.S. and Canadian accounts connectable
  • Free to use

Cons

  • Can only set a budget for the current month
  • Because Mint can be used in a more hands-off way, it may not prove effective for some users in saving money, paying down debt, etc.
  • Web interface design is less attractive and user-friendly
  • Web and mobile interface includes ads and offers

YNAB vs. Mint: Approach

These two personal finance tools serve the same fundamental purpose, which is to assist you in better understanding where and how much money you spend so that you may decide how to manage your resources going forward. However, while Mint adopts a very well-known method, YNAB presents a far more innovative approach that is significantly different not only in its execution but also in the user’s whole way of thinking.

Both apps require you to connect your credit card and bank accounts in order to the platform to record every transaction. You can then classify each transaction based on its expenditure or earning category. With this data, Mint can then provide reports detailing your spending patterns over various time frames for each category. This then gives you the ability to decide on budget amounts for each of your expenditure categories for this month. You may also just compare your expenditure this month to what it was last month or a year ago.

With YNAB, on the other hand, making a budget is not an optional step; rather, it serves as the basis for the entire platform and the YNAB philosophy. Giving every dollar a job is how YNAB describes its approach, which requires you to decide what you’ll do with each dollar you earn before the month even starts. YNAB requires you to allocate your income to things you prioritize rather than just viewing your spending. Then, rather than making impulsive purchases, it is simply a matter of adhering to that plan.

YNAB vs. Mint: Features

As well as allowing you to set savings goals and slice and dice your financial data into various analytical views, both Mint and YNAB offer register views of individual accounts as well as an aggregate transaction log of all your accounts.

Mint can keep track of your bills in addition to account balances and transactions. The bills area will automatically display accounts you have linked, such as credit cards, with the minimum payment due, the balance as of the most recent statement, and the current balance. However, you can also include additional expenditures, such as your monthly cell phone bill or your water bill. Even if your bill’s payee is outside the Mint world, you can manually add that account.

The fact that Mint does not offer complete category customisation is one of its shortcomings. It allows you to add your own subcategories to the already-existing master categories (such as Auto & Transport, Food & Dining, etc.), but you are unable to change or remove any master categories or subcategories created by Mint. The only thing you can do is add more subcategories.

YNAB’s design, in contrast, enables you to fully customize your whole set of categories and subcategories, making it more appealing for people with specific preferences or less common spending kinds.

YNAB vs. Mint: Account Setup

You must first link your numerous financial accounts in order to track your expenses in either app. Your online login and password must be entered after selecting the financial institution where you have an account. Mint and YNAB then establish an ongoing link to that account, which is frequently updated with new transactions.

Mint enables you to add additional loan or investment accounts after you’ve added all of your bank and credit card accounts. This enables you to monitor their current balances as part of Mint’s comprehensive view of your net worth. But keep in mind that these account types do not permit managing or interacting in any way with specific transactions. It is a “read only” link for these accounts, to put it another way.

Setting up an account is just the start of YNAB. The core of YNAB’s strategy is to use the knowledge gained from examining your previous expenditure to make a plan for how you’ll spend your income for the next month. The crucial step of assigning your dollars in the budget section of the program comes after account setup.

YNAB vs. Mint: Ease of Use

It’s incredibly simple to use Mint. In order to categorize and evaluate your transactions in order to set budget amounts, you link your accounts, which causes the transactions to populate. As you use the app, you may start to create a set of “rules” that can be used to speed up the process by automatically renaming and classifying transactions that it can identify based on your prior usage.

By selecting the relevant tab on the web interface or the app, you can quickly analyze your reports, establish or track progress toward savings objectives, and review your budget.

However, the desktop experience of Mint may use some improvement. The transaction register is small despite the straightforward navigation, especially when compared to YNAB’s more user-friendly register design. The web-based Mint dashboard is also a touch underwhelming.

YNAB’s account creation is straightforward, but it can take some effort to learn how to use the monthly budgeting feature. YNAB advises you to select in advance where you will allocate each dollar of your income rather than relying on bank balances to determine how much money you have left to spend that month. It may take some getting used to this new strategy, but that’s the whole point. YNAB wants to alter the way you approach money and how proactive you are.

While Mint just enables you to set your budget for the current month, YNAB also enables you to build spending plans for as many months in the future as you’d like.

Conclusion

There are a variety of budgeting software available on the market. To choose the right one for your business, you first need to determine what type of budgeting software it is. Different budgeting software have different features and can be used in different ways. After choosing the right budgeting software, you then need to use it to create a budget for the year. This will help you track your spending and income so that you can make necessary adjustments. Finally, you should monitor your budget every month and week to ensure that your overall spending is within your desired range.

Leave a Comment